


it never feels the same as before

by LeanMeanSaltineMachine



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Flash Fic, Flash Fiction, Gen, POV Second Person, Podfic Welcome, Warnings Change per Drabble
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-03-15
Updated: 2020-12-30
Packaged: 2021-02-28 19:01:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 22
Words: 4,045
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23152153
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LeanMeanSaltineMachine/pseuds/LeanMeanSaltineMachine
Summary: a collection of flash fiction/drabbles about people i know and vibes i've felt inspired by the fears.--1. it would break the repression to say it's sad so much of your life is defined by fear so put it back. hammer the nails back in. there we go. better.2. you're looking for something / you keep looking / you keep looking.3. i am so alone in here. i am so alone out there. aren't we always alone. weren't we meant to be alone?18. webs, chess, writing. put things where they need to go.19. Eye to microscope, eye to macroscope, eye to muscle, eye to flesh.
Comments: 4
Kudos: 8





	1. Jon: Eye/Hunt/Web

**Author's Note:**

> content warnings for this chapter: mild scopophobia, feeling watched, mild feeling of being hunted
> 
> artists may draw art for this chapter :)

it would break the repression to say it's sad so much of your life is defined by fear so put it back. hammer the nails back in. there we go. better. instead, you like to search. high and low. what for? we don't say. we? you. you don't say. there's no we here. never was. never could be. that watched sensation? there's no eyes. no sensation of too many legs. no teeth in the dark.

monsters. if you became one, could you fight back? probably not. they're always going to be bigger than you. run.

running. running towards or away? running for? but you run. always faster. sometimes you stop and you breathe clear fresh air and the world is quiet and swirls around you and you hear - 

something. probably nothing. a voice on the wind. it says - you frown. something? you pivot. you walk. you jog. you run. you need to know, you need to know, and you want to know so badly, the answer tastes so sweet on your tongue and you laugh and the freedom is so good and even the monsters behind you love the chase so everyone is happy, even now, in the end, it is so bittersweet.

it is so bittersweet, the knowing and the running and the strings that pull you forward, the cobwebs in your footsteps, the eyes that love and hate you, the fear that sings so sweetly in the dark.


	2. jay #1: lonely/eye/hunt-slaughter

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> desperate/searching/alone
> 
> cw: minor existentialism
> 
> artists welcome

you're looking for something, you don't know what, but you're looking very hard, near desperate for it. you KNOW it's out there, know it to your bones, except that it might not exist, because there's no meaning to anything is there? and that's terrifying. and you don't know anything, really, and no one knows you, and that's also terrifying. and you keep looking, because there's a beautiful world out there, and you keep looking, and you're terribly, horribly alone, and you find such beautiful, comfortable sadness in it, and even as you look you know there's something looking back.

but what if there isn't?


	3. cody #1: lonely/corruption-spiral/vast-buried

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> no content warnings
> 
> artists welcome

"show you a permanent sense of the self." there isn't one. nothing is steady. nothing is a constant. and something in you recognizes that as a fear. but more of you welcomes the dissonance, says come and stay with me, come and dwell in me, as you already do in nature, in my mind, in my body. i am so alone in here. i am so alone out there. aren't we always alone. weren't we meant to be alone? isn't it comfortable to be alone? i think when i am tired of being alone, i will not know who i am. sometimes i am almost tired of being alone, and i am afraid.

lay me down in the dirt. lay me down in all my worries and all my cares, for i have so many of them. the roots will come to cover me. the world will spread before me. eventually i will rise and see the world and wide wide ocean for what it is: unconquerable and vast. the universe will welcome its speck home, and i will breathe out anxiety and breathe in love. there was only ever us to fear, maybe. and that was an awful lot, in the first place.


	4. sahara #1 - eye/desolation/stranger

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> cw: unreality, dissociation

burning questions, yes. the need to KNOW. but also - those things don't belong to you. they never did. what things? those things. over there. that picture on the wall. that sentimental object. those stacks of papers. that privacy. your eyes, your mind, your state of being. those things were never really yours, you see, it was silly of you to think that.

the common thread - what belongs to you? information? no. physical things that make up a home? a body? no. nothing is quite right. everything can be proven wrong. nothing can be proven right. you’ve burned/turned/proven it all to nothing. isn’t it beautiful, to be free? isn’t it awful, to have nothing holding you back?


	5. dusk #1: end/vast/beholding-corruption

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> cw: irrelevance after death/nihilism, blunt discussion of death

so. i bet you're something of a stare out the windows type. a 'i like long car rides' type. a ‘fall in love with a book’ type. you are so small, at the end of things. you were made to be. everything was made to forget you, including yourself, your own memory. and you don't see that as a tragedy - it's just fact. just the way it is. and there's so much else out there worth knowing outside of yourself it would be a little self-centered to go around being sad about it for a whole 100 or 50 or 20 or however long years you're supposed to live so.

Yeah. 

and isn't it strange, how that living goes on? gets a little... weird? a little twisted? a little sick? that it stops, so suddenly, or it looks a lot like death, that the death looks a lot like living? and sickness it just. creeps in. creeps in like vines that can help sturdy a tree or kill the sunlight from reaching the leaves, creeps in like mitochondria are parasites that we can't live without, creeps in like poisonous toadstools in the front yard after a hard rain. isn't it fascinating? doesn't it make your gut curl?


	6. Mar #1 - Eye/Web/Spiral

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> cw - unreality

You like to snoop a little, like to know things, particularly about people. This doesn't mean that you like to make yourself known to people, necessarily, but the little facts about them, their trivia, what makes them tick, what they get up to, their mannerisms, their connections, their ideas - 

People are fascinating.

And it's fun to watch them interact with others. To study them. To predict how they may interact. And if it's even more fun to wade in sometimes, offer advice, suggest someone talk to someone else, put a person at the right place at the right time, and oh it's good to know the right people! Put the right words in the right ears!

Pull the right strings.

Sometimes there are doubts. Just a wonder about what's real and what isn't. What do you think you know? What do you perceive, what is the world others know, what is real?

Thankfully, nothing. There is nothing real, there is nothing to be done about it, there is nothing to know or not know or understand.

All there is, is to play the game.


	7. lauren #1 - eye/hunt/vast

eye-hunt. looking for something. it could be there, it might not, but the joy is in the searching, the Hunt, the Looking. you turn the pages, you scan the woods, you pound the pavement and turn on lights. it's out there, you think, even if the answer is the fact it was a wild goose chase. but now you know.

now you know.

the world is full. it overwhelms you - but it doesn't. there is so much to know and not enough time, you could fall into the pages of an encyclopedia and climb out the set of volumes and not even scratch the surface of everything you could possibly come to understand. understanding. is that what you even want? or are you after the mention of a fresh idea? the new chase?

you glimpse a new horizon. a scent of something changing. it's time to go - the library, the world, the universe is ever-expanding, and you must race to meet it.


	8. lee #1 - eye/hunt/vast

eye-hunt. always searching. the curl in your gut. you know there's a story. the curl on your lips. you found the story. the gleam in your eyes. you are the story.

here's the thing: it is a choice to be kind.

hunting. it is such a thin line between the hunter and the prey. the heart beats-beats-beats. it is the fear and the anticipation. the heart in the mouth, the adrenaline, i-cannot-think-i-cannot-breathe-where-do-i-go-i-must-go. and the story is the prey: are you the subject or the reporter?

here's the thing: it is a choice to be kind, and it has to be made, and sometimes you hear the siren call of people and How They Are and How to Read Them and even How to Play and you make the wrong choice and you don’t even know the choice you made.

the hunt. you hate to be hunted. you fear it. and yet, when you catch eyes with someone on the sidewalk, you look at them and grin, and hope that your teeth flash in the light, and maybe this will be the night your nails grow to something approximating claws. and maybe the hunt will be something that you can fear and chase in equal measure. 

here's the thing: it is like coming home to finally be surrounded by nothing and yourself.

you want the sea, the pounding of the waves, the smell of salt. you want to stand in the middle of the prairie and see waving grass for miles and miles. you want to stand in the middle of a mountain range and let the sky swallow you up. sometimes, you open your computer, and look at galaxies lightyears away, and contemplate the vastness of this universe we live in.

it cradles you.


	9. Cecil #1 - Eye/Spiral

How fast do you go, Cecil? How fast do you pick up the pieces? Connect the dots, string the threads, open the doors - run run run, Cecil! Or tiptoe, my friend, for knowledge is heavy, and no one likes a caught spy.

You say you understand, Cecil. Do you? You hoard your little info bites and trivia of people and places like it means anything to you and you know it doesn't because you can't even do anything. It sits there in your boxes and you know it's useless and you drive yourself crazy, you run yourself ragged, you peer into windows and locked doors and broken hearts and find yourself in places you frankly should never be for the sake of some extra clue, something that will make it all click, this time it will all make sense -

_ It's never going to make sense, Cecil. _

It's a good thing you have a home in the Spiral. Your true home. We both know it. The Distortion, the surreal, the known but untrustworthy. Put down your burdens. Scatter your keys to those locked boxes you've collected.

Yes. You'll never understand. It's better that way.


	10. chicken #1 (eye/lonely/web?)

Touchstone, cornerstone, anchor. You reach out, pluck a string/fruit/cord, take a step. Venture forth. Lose your way. See the fog? All alone. Terrifying, isn't it. No one around, except for you.

Why are you laughing? _Why is it thrilling, _the sense you have no burden to share? Run, knowledge seeker, time to go, back to your cornerstone, back to your anchor, your string pulls you back. Is it your home or your prison? Did you choose it? Does it matter?__

__It is so hard to choose but that doesn't matter. The connections, the blurred lines, the shades - swipe a hand over chalkboard, make out the shapes. What do you see?_ _

__Fog. You're alone. Something looks over your shoulder._ _


	11. lee #2 (eye-hunt/vast/web)

Strings with lights, beautiful, many, stretching, intersecting, weaving, alone in quadrants and parallel and woven in stands thick and ugly and beautiful. You could study a rope for hours. You already have. You look up at the mirrors, see the strings reflected, the lights dancing - see the patterns. You know these stories. Know these players. It is different every time, yes, but you watch the glimmers shine and know we are not so unpredictable. 

It stretches. Vast and unseen for miles and kilometers and only nanometers it is the size of the universe, to walk through the string is to watch them tremble and dance. Sometimes you do it lightly. Other times you step with the power of titans, giants. It does not matter the heaviness of your weight - each time there is a thrill as you watch yourself ripple across space and time, feel it ache in your bones and spread across your face in a satisfied smile. Patterns. Sometimes you recognize them. Sometimes you make them.

There is a light, in the distance, glinting, and it calls to you. You know the way. How to shift and step, how to move, the strings to touch and croon to and tie together. Sometimes you mishear the song but. Well. There's no time. Keep moving. It calls you.


	12. martin (eye/web/lonely)

follow the strings. you're curious, aren't you. where do they go? where do they meet? they tangle in books, around fingers; they tie in hearts and dangle under doorways and you watch them follow them feel the tug tug tug along your limbs heart eyes.

there's a steady beat to it.

you see the connections. you know where to go and where to see. it was not always so easy. it was not always so lonely. you have learned how to hide in plain sight, how to be a friend, to be known without the bruises. you pluck sometimes - watch the vibrations send you gifts. the things you need. but never the things you want. the cold wracks your bones, strums the strings, pulls pulls pulls. it is gentle, the walk forward, the embracing arms of fog - surrender, resignation, always is.


	13. Purreve (Eye/Corruption/Spiral)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> cw: death mention

You grin a little wildly. Every time I see you you're in motion, this spinning creature; who do you serve, little one? Who do you crawl for? Who do you search for? In the depth of the night when your wings shiver to make night songs and rot creeps into dead logs so they collapse into themselves to match the shape of the bones in your hands - what do you know? And you laugh at me like the sounds you cannot describe because you heard them from a dream beast who chased you awake (and waits behind the final door) --

You are constantly dying, you tell me, connected to the earth as you are, your insects live and die every day. But rot and mushrooms are immortal. Knowledge and its misunderstandings will live in my mind forever. I am forever movement. I will stand as still as I wish.

You, purreve, have a delightful smile.


	14. mango (spiral/desolation)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> cw - burning motifs, fears of unreality

watch the flame rise higher, does it twist and burn? is it a flame or is it your soul? if it extinguishes, burn another. there's so much cruelty in the world, your heart burns with it. does your body ever turn inward, inward, do you ever curl outward, outward; clutch your pearls, dear one, swipe at your tears, loved one, you see it's all burning down in the revolution.

did you set the first spark to the tinder or was it your brother(-in-arms, your best friend, your father, your dearest mentor--)? your heart/mind/soul/hand is breaking but it broke before, it mended crooked; shove it back into place, nothing is real anymore, everything already hurts, you are always hurting, aren't you?

what is even real, anymore?

always looking forward, always looking back, always looking to the side because you are afraid and desperate for the patterns but there is nothing to see, is there? it's all just spilling out in front of you like paint and you roll in it like the gasoline you spill every night: light yourself aflame (you burn so cold), throw yourself away.

throw yourself away.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> revolutions are always happening. we do not have to grow numb. stand with the protestors, stand against the police force, and find your sources of strength.
> 
> for those who are already pushed past that point, i'm sorry. i've been there too. find a shield and cry if you can. i'll weep with you. you aren't alone.


	15. Peter (Flesh/Eye)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> cw - lots of gore, body horror, death mention

You know how bodies look and work because you have to see it again and again. Is it a joy? Is it a fear? His jaw falls off. Her muscles slough. Their skin flakes. You watch peer take a gander at. The inevitable eye. Was there ever a time you flinched? Did it ever really matter? You shared with me without asking. Teeth, you said. You opened your bloody palms to me with a grin. And yet last night you didn't want to be a bother.

Where do you stand, Peter? Such a small, unobtrusive fellow, lest it's about your bones.

Yes. The watcher. No harm there. Just bloody footprints from the thing that follows. I don't fear you. Nothing fears you. The little reaper scavenger that comes and peers around Death's cloak, sits on the edge of the bed when Corruption comes to visit. You make a good friend to them. Lovely conversationalist. (The ones you watch don't tend to have abilities with which to share their opinions.)


	16. Ambrose (Lonely/Eye)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> cw: the lonely being insiduous

shhhh, the clicking tells you. shhhh. it is safe here. it is safe.

you open your mouth to argue. it is instinctual. you have so many words to say --

shhh. says the haze. shhhhh.

the haze. what to say of the haze? it is the gloss of the screen when you scroll for meaning. it is when you add to a conversation and it is not appreciated. it is when the clicking of computer keys in the library sings to you in time with the blinking of your cursor on your own blank screen.

the haze of watching a conversation three tables away. consuming information that will never apply to you. imagining every impossible scenario so you will be prepared.

you have so many words to share. you are tired of being hushed.

shhhh says the haze. shhhhhh.


	17. Damian (Eye/Vast/Lonely)

busy. there is... a lot to learn. not all that you would like to - some you must learn to get to what you truly want - but. there is so much. it stretches in front of your hungry eyes and you step forward, ever forward; people drop from your side and you never notice. starving scholar, are you lonely? turning pages echoing in an empty room, facts swirling in your head with more room to twirl as there are no bodies around you; you study the horizon and it eases the headache of dim lights. reminds you of the outside. remember the shapes of storm clouds, as you travel what others say, damian. as you pick and choose what to echo, as the shelves begin to close in, remember why you love what you do.

there is so much out there.

step alone into the sea of knowledge. fall into the scale of time and us. stars twinkle our insignificance as you leave the library at 2 am. are you in love with the universe, yet? take the time, damian, to love the waves of history that lap at your feet. smile at the wind when it whispers tales of what it saw when it touched the freedom of the prairie.


	18. rowinha (eye/vast/web)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this chapter dedicated to serè, who reminded me i have snippets i have not yet posted, and also inspired me to write another!

webs, chess, writing. put things where they need to go. absent-minded, keen eyes, fingers trailing over wood, over computer keys, over warm shoulders. a gentle nudge. a push. a shove. a whisper. a sigh. a smile. a disapproving stare. you know - the tricks of the trade.

yes, you weave, it is never easy, never done. it is always a full-body dance around and through and under; sometimes you are seen, mostly... you watch. it is funny, you think, how much watching you do, for how much you move. when you are still, you are your most dangerous. that's when they come to you. that's when they're trapped.

endless little stories. endless little dances. the patterns go on and on and on. don't you get bored, little weaver? they ask you. don't you get bored, of your little games, your trinkets?

you arch your brow. tired of your grand schemes and machinations, are we? you return. they are blind, you think. your eyes have never left the horizon - your links create a chain stretching farther than the sea.


	19. spooky (eye/flesh)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> tw: blood, gore, general flesh/meat shebang
> 
> may be triggering for people with depersonalization disorder? not sure. does feature identities meshing/melding.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> might take another crack at this at some point, i'm not entirely happy with how it turned out. still, enjoy!

Peer in close. Eye to microscope, eye to macroscope, eye to muscle, eye to flesh. Blood in bone, blood on skin, blood on floor, blood in mouth. Blood in your mouth? Blood in my mouth. Drink it, swallow it - back where it belongs. Where does it belong? It belongs where it should - to be of the most use. Back in the body. Whose body? The small body there is not so different from me. I am so smart. I can study. I put my eye to flesh and look. Look how I look. The small body looks back. (It does not look back. It does not look back because I ate it.)

The blood is where it can be of most use. I feel it course through my veins. You offer your veins to me. You are to be studied. We meld together and we are now two bodies and one body and two minds and one mind. I look into you. Eye to flesh, eye to muscle, eye to macroscope, eye to microscope. Peer in close. There is blood in mouth, blood on floor, blood on skin, blood in bone. All is as it should be.

Tilt our head back. Laugh. Meat is you is me is meat. There is no greater joy than the freedom of release. “What is meat?” they stress. “I cannot eat. I worry. I fear.” We laugh. We croon. We have blood on our teeth. Meat is you! Me! We are meat! There is no greater glory.


	20. Andy (Eye)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> cw: none, but lemme know if i should add something!

watch, but don't understand. and you watch everything, don't you? watching people in their everyday lives, so so closely, wishing to know more. learning as much as you can about what you love. gathering in resources in arms reach. little hoards. you, andy, _stare_. 

what is it about the knowing, that intrigues you so? is it the freshness? the sorting of it in your mind? you smile and laugh when you have information others don't but it doesn't come naturally to you. you sit and share your pile of files and theories that you fail to understand cheerfully and hope it lets you be known. 

known. what is it to be known. toss a smile over your shoulder and a couple pieces of information, dance away.

 _privacy._ how many hints do you have to drop before people come looking? they never see the trail. never do the work. it's crystal clear to you - but they never care, do they. so you make it easy, finally, and it was the wrong time, the wrong people, a waste. ugh. this is why you make it clues.

clues. you stand on the edge of a cliff. you see the answer on the other side. _build a bridge,_ they beg you. you have the boards next to you. supplies. but...! you feel budding wings.

hm. yes. so much better to fall and try to fly. and one more hail mary for those who should have known better than to ask it of you in the first place.


	21. serè (web/eye/lonely)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> cw: stalking mention, implication of manipulation, spiders as a theme

I do not watch you to be your stalker. I do not keep one eye on you with some malicious intent or to gather information. To be perfectly clear: I circle you so I never have my back to your eight eyes watching from your solitary web. A spider acts alone, but the silk clings to everything it touches. Whether your actions are taken with love, or hate, or indifference does not matter: the effect is the same.

You croon to me so sweetly. Our eyes meeting is something I crave and fear in equal measure. I think you are in love with everyone you meet. It’s a dangerous ploy for a spider. Are they not solitary predators? Are they not easily brushed aside, avoided?

But you always come back, don’t you? Even when you fear you aren’t wanted.

Perhaps especially then.

At least you have your strings, and your many, many eyes. At least here in your web you can memorize the patterns of your interests. Here in your web you can weave your own. Here in your web you and I circle each other because I love being seen and fear being understood. And you know that I know that all it takes to break a web is one

good

pull.


	22. Murder God (Web/Lonely/Spiral)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> pov: murder god from Discord Murder Party

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> please note i am only on season 2 ep something (13 i think) so the analyzing here may be off
> 
> cw: oddly enough? none. incredibly surprising for the source!

How long have you been alone here?

No. Focus. That’s not the question.

Question is: how to bend. How to twist. How to pull.

You have them wrapped around your fingers. _They have you wrapped around theirs --_

No! No. Refract the plot, there’s an unreliable narrator, a story with no protagonist --

Narrative structure. You can do that. Yes. You’ve always been able to do that. The writer’s room is lonely, sure but the price to pay for a good story is never too high.

_Never?_ Never! Never.

Deep breath in. Cat’s cradle. Let’s spin a tale for the ages.


End file.
